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Sunday, January 5, 2014

Make flowers and leaves from gumdrops

What would you do with a bunch of leftover gumdrops? Would you eat them or toss them out?

Or, would you try something a bit different? Would you burn them... or melt them... or nuke 'em? Eeek. What evil candy torturer would do that? Oh wait, I already did all those things in my 6 strange things to do with gummy bears post... muah ha ha.

This time I took a different route and turned my colorful gummy candy into gumdrop flowers. Why, you ask? Why not! After seeing these lovely gumdrop rose petals I pulled out my candy and got a'smooshing and a'cutting. By the end of the night I had me a lovely bouquet of gumdrop flowers:

Ooooh. Perrrrrty....

Have I intrigued you? Keep on reading to see how these lovely flowers were made...

Materials:

Gumdrops

Parchment paper

Kitchen shears

Damp cloth and dry cloth (or sit nearby a sink)

Directions:

1. Cover your work area with parchment paper. This will prevent your gumdrops from sticking to your work surface.

2. To make the petals and leaves, you'll need to smoosh your gumdrops. I used my thumb and the back of my palm to squish them. Now, be warned! The more you squish them, the stickier they will get. If your hands get too sticky, wipe them on the wet cloth and them dry them off. (Or, you could just wash and dry your hands too.)

3. To make two colored petals, smoosh two different colored gumdrops and them combine them by smooshing them together. (Experiment with different color combinations til you get your desired look.)

4. Sometimes I smooshed the two colors together with my palm. But then my hands started getting way too sticky, so I sandwiched the gumdrops between two pieces of parchment paper and smooshed them..

5. Then, use your kitchen shears to cut petal or leaf shapes out.

6. Stick your different pieces together to create leaves, buds, and flowers.

Notes:

If your scissors get too sticky, just wash and dry them.

Don't throw away any unused smooshed gumdrop bits. You might need them to add to another flower later.